-David

In 2004, Morgan Spurlock released the documentary “Supersize Me”, criticizing the fast food industry as the primary culprit behind the increasing obesity epidemic in the United States. And while I agree that fast food is generally terrible for one’s health, I had the sneaking suspicion that much of the “science”, and many of the claims in Spurlock’s movie, were more sensationalism than fact. I had also heard of a “counter-documentary” disproving many of Spurlock’s claims. And now I’ve found it.

The following movie, “Fat Head”, was made by comedian and health writer Tom Naughton. It leaves little doubt that Spurlock’s original piece was hardly objective.

In my opinion, the second half of the documentary is of most value. While the first half focuses more on the politics behind *why* the American public has been scammed concerning “healthy eating”, the second half focuses on the actual science: how cholesterol works, how carbohydrates work, how insulin works, and what we’re really supposed to eat. For anybody that feels a bit “confused” with this whole nutrition thing, I highly recommend you watch this movie– it will help to clear up a LOT of confusion regarding healthy eating!

-David

I posted the details of the meal plan on my Facebook page. Take a look at it here…

Facebook Bodybuilding Meal Plan

Healthy Supplementation: How to Make Use of the Tools Available to You

IntroThe supplement industry is a big-dollar industry. For anybody who has ever purchased a bodybuilding magazine, you’ll know what I mean. I subscribe to a magazine called “Muscular Development”. Of it’s 500-pages that they crank out every single month, at least one-half of those pages are devoted to advertising for supplements. That’s 250 pages of advertisements! The same holds true of pretty much every other health and fitness magazine.

If publications aren’t persuasive, turn to the television. There has been a recent rash of advertisements for products that will help you to get in shape and lose fat for the first time of your life. You know what I’m talking about– “Cortislim”, “TrimSpa”, “Smartburn”, “Hydrocut” (you know, the commercial with the guy in a lab coat who looks like a doctor, then they show him ripped and running down the beach?). The commercials are abundant.

Or take a look around on the street corners nowadays. I remember 10 years ago, seeing a GNC was fairly rare. I went to the GNC website the other day and counted 120 different locations in the state of Maryland alone! This is in addition to all of the other fast-growing companies and stores that carry health and fitness supplements.

I couldn’t find any specific hard facts as to how much money the supplement industry rakes in every year, but suffice it to say, it’s a multi-billion dollar industry, and it’s going to grow much larger before it shrinks.

Yet, the obesity rate of this country is growing faster and faster. With these GNCs popping up all over the place, and all of these TV ads helping us to get trim, why are we all getting progressively fatter?

I don’t want to use this talk as a means to lambaste and degrade the supplement industry. Plenty of people within the health and fitness industry are already doing that. Rather, I want to make the point that supplements are precisely that– supplements! What exactly is meant by that? It means that a dietary supplement is a means to make life a little bit easier; it’s a way to supplement a diet that is already fairly healthy, and to supplement an exercise program that is already aimed at achieving your goals. There is no magic pill that is going to get your to your physique goals. And once you understand a bit more about supplements, you’ll understand why.

One of the most important things to understand right off the bat is the difference between supplements and drugs. In the United States of America, we have the Food and Drug Agency, or the FDA, which helps to regulate the safety and efficacy of various foods and drugs. Not everybody knows that the FDA regulates drugs, but in general, does not regulate supplements. As such, health supplements generally do not need to be proven effective in order to be sold.

According to the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN), the “FDA regulates dietary supplements under a different set of regulations than those covering ‘conventional’ foods and drug products (prescription and Over-the-Counter). Under the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA), the dietary supplement manufacturer is responsible for ensuring that a dietary supplement is safe before it is marketed. FDA is responsible for taking action against any unsafe dietary supplement product after it reaches the market. Generally, manufacturers do not need to register their products with FDA nor get FDA approval before producing or selling dietary supplements.^* Manufacturers must make sure that product label information is truthful and not misleading.” (http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~dms/supplmnt.html) Because of this, supplement manufacturers can make some fairly wild claims without any substantial backing or evidence, and so long as their product is not positively hurting people, they are completely within their legal rights to claim as much.

Now don’t take this the wrong way– I am not saying that all supplement manufacturers are bad and are out to rip off the general public. Rather, my point is that you have to be careful about what you’re getting yourself into. Many of the larger supplement manufacturers who’ve been around for a while perform independent testing on their products to make sure that they provide the effects claimed. If the company was simply making false claims left and right, there’s a very good chance it would have gone out of business long ago. There are many places online that independently test the validity of various manufacturer’s claims, such as www.supplementwatch.com.

But there’s another important point to be garnered from the above: by and large, supplements are not as powerful as drugs! The pharmaceutical and drug industry is, to date, much larger and more powerful than the supplement industry. If a given supplement really did provide as strong a benefit as many manufacturers claim, chances are that either 1) that supplement would also have strong side effect, and as such, the FDA would step in to regulate it, or 2) the pharmaceutical industry would do everything in its power to see that supplement regulated, so as to maximize profits with drugs that can be patented (such as the recent orlistat, or alli).

What does all of the above mean? It means that the average American needs to stop turning to supplements to meet their health and fitness needs. If supplements are used properly– as a supplement to a health diet and exercise routine– then they can help to enhance results a bit. However, they will never take the place of healthy diet and exercise. The problem is, GNC and other such stores are not growing at the same rate as McDonalds and the like, and as such, our country is still walking down the road to obesity.

There’s no one way to split supplements into their various classifications. The way I most prefer is how they do it at wikipedia.com, namely “dietary supplements” or “food supplements”, vs. “bodybuilding supplements”. As stated on the wikipedia website, “…a distinction is sometimes drawn between dietary and exercise supplements, while this method of classification is not followed by all those who use supplements. If a distinction does exist, dietary supplements are often defined as those supplements that aim to give the body more of the nutrients that it ought to get from diet, but isn’t for whatever reason. Protein, meal replacement and amino acid (in smaller quantities) based supplements are usually considered to be dietary supplements. Exercise supplements, however, involve raising a particular nutrient level far beyond what is typically consumed by a human for the explicit purpose of experiencing a positive side effect when combined with weight training. Creatine is a good example of an exercise supplement in that, while it is found in the body naturally, users typically ingest far more than is usually needed in order to saturate their muscles and achieve a much greater muscle gaining benefit.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodybuilding_supplement)

So the first important category here is what we’re going to call simply a dietary supplement. These are going to consist of simple items that people should be getting from a healthy diet and, for whatever reason (time restrictions, eating restrictions, etc.), they are not able to do so. The first item to mention here would be a good multi vitamin/multi mineral. Simply stated, most people’s diets are not thorough enough to get in all of the vitamins and minerals needed for general health, and as such, a good multi is recommended by most in the health and fitness industry. Next on the list would be various items aimed at allowing one to eat in a nutritious manner, namely, different types of shakes and bars. These items, used appropriately, can make it easier to eat properly. For instance, for somebody with a really hectic job who doesn’t have time to eat breakfast in the morning, it would be preferable to grab a meal replacement bar on the way out the door and eat it on the train, rather than skipping breakfast. When you use meal replacement items appropriately, they can help you with your weight management and fitness goals.

Before we get to bodybuilding supplements, there is an important grouping of items that could be considered halfway between basic food-based dietary supplements and performance-enhancing supplements. Good examples would be joint-health supplements (such as a glucosamine/chondroiton complex). Extra omega-3 in the diet, via a fish-oil supplement or a flax supplement, would also fall in this category.

Finally, we can get to the “bodybuilding supplements”. These are going to consist of micronutrients and/or herbs that can somehow enhance performance, or theoretically get somebody to his or her goal more quickly than simply eating a healthy diet.

The first, and most obvious, would be creatine. Creatine was one of the first well-studied sports supplements. Creatine is a substance naturally found in certain foods, particularly red meat. In a nutshell, it helps to store extra energy in the cell so that one can work out harder when trying to build muscle. Another quickly-rising supplement in this regard is called beta-alanine, which works much the same way that creatine does. Glutamine is another popular supplement used by weight lifters. Many studies indicate that glutamine will help broken-down tissues to heal faster, thus helping the individual to recuperate between workouts so they can work out again sooner. One of the most popular types of workout supplements being used nowadays is variations of nitric oxide, or NO. Many of the drinks we sell in the café cooler contain NO. Nitric oxide basically allows for the smooth muscle surrounding blood vessels to relax, which leads to increased blood flow to the muscles of the body. At least in theory, this leads to a better “pump”, and with increased blood flow to muscles, you have increased nutrient and hormone levels arriving at the target muscles you are training, and thus a better training response.

The final broad category of supplements used more in a “bodybuilding” context would be thermogenics, or fat-loss aids. This is probably the category of supplements that the average American is most likely to invest in. Ironically, it also appears to be the category of supplements that many recreational bodybuilders are most rapidly moving away from using. A thermogenic is a substance that artificially stimulates the body’s natural metabolism, typically by stimulating the adrenaline response of the body. Basically, by taking a thermogenic, you are putting your body into “fight or flight” mode throughout the day. This increased adrenaline, which increases heat production and metabolism, and thus you burn more calories throughout the day. They also tend to suppress appetite, since the last thing the body is worried about when in danger mode is food. The major problem with thermogenics in the long run is that your body becomes adapted to them in a fairly short time span. Many believe that your natural metabolism will fall as a result of artificially stimulating it, and thus, in the long run (since you can’t take thermogenic products forever), you are doing yourself more harm than good by taking them. The most popular item in this category, traditionally, was the ephedra-caffeine-aspirin stack, which is no longer legal. Most thermogenic products have replaced the ephedra with other items claiming to boost metabolism, such as hoodia, EGCG (found in green tea), bitter orange, or other such naturally-found herbs. I personally am of the opinion that it’s reasonable to use a small amount of thermogenics for short-term results, but more for energy than anything else, particularly when exercising. For the sake of fat-loss, I think they do very little compared to healthy diet and exercise.

Your supplement regimen should be unique not only to your goals, but to your health as well. What types of injuries do you have– joint problems? Do you train with weights several times a week, or once a week? Are you actively trying to become significantly more muscular, or are you looking simply to “tone up”?

The first stop for most people will be a multi-vitamin, multi-mineral. This will complement pretty much everybody’s lifestyle.

Next would be to secure your daily eating habits. If you are not eating 100% properly, with a minimum of 4-6 small meals throughout the day, are you at least using meal replacement bars and/or shakes to meet your quota? If not, you’re short-changing your metabolism and you’re probably not going to see the results you had hoped to see.

Next up for most should be supplements aimed at general health. If you have joint problems, invest in a glucosamine/chondroiton complex. Also, invest in a good omega-3 fatty acid supplement. (Many people now believe this is the supplement of the future, and will lead to a huge decrease in cardiovascular disease, if utilized properly.) If you are working out hard several times a week and you seem to have a hard time recovering, glutamine might help you get through healing more efficiently.

Next up would be investing in the supplements that can help you improve your performance. If you are serious about packing on some muscle, creatine would probably be the first stop, followed by either a nitric-oxide product or beta-alanine. Believe it or not, lots of studies have shown that simple caffeine can often improve workout performance immensely. Just remember, you quickly build a tolerance to it, and will not be able to reap the benefits indefinitely. And finally, if you feel it’s appropriate for you, you could look into various fat-loss supplements, whether thermogenics, or something a bit fancier like conjugated-linoleic acid (CLA).

-the supplement industry is growing exponentially, right alongside the obesity epidemic in America

-turning to supplements will not solve all health and fitness problems, nor will it make a huge difference in achieving your goals, though judicious use of the proper supplements can help a bit

-the supplement industry is not regulated, so effects and benefits of supplements are usually fairly minimal compared to the effect that can be achieved via proper diet and exercise

-supplements are there to help supplement a healthy diet and workout routine

-we can classify supplements as either “dietary” in nature, which are intended to help reach baseline levels of health, or “bodybuilding/performance” in nature, which are intended to surpass baseline levels of performance and/or health in certain regards

-one’s supplement regimen should be unique to the individual and his/her goals

When shopping, make sure you have a pre-planned list. Do NOT just wander into the store with a “mental list” of what you think you need, and then allow impulse to pull you in eight different directions. If you stick with a list of healthy items, and don’t deviate, it will be impossible to pick up all the garbage.

Also, do NOT shop on an empty stomach! If you know you have to go grocery shopping in an hour and you haven’t eaten in a while, MAKE SURE YOU EAT A HEALTHY MEAL BEFORE YOU GO! The human animal, while very sophisticated and intelligent, is STILL an animal! If you are ravenous and you smell items in the bakery, you WILL cave to them, regardless of will power and oaths to the contrary! Besides, why put yourself through the misery? If you are full of nutritious food, you will not be NEARLY as likely to be lured to bad choices while shopping.

Insofar as you have to shop the aisles for various items (like bread, cereal, food for the kids, whatever), you will probably have to get into the habit of reading nutrition labels. This doesn’t mean you have to be a label-hound for the rest of your life. But doing so for a short period of time can be very educational and help you to make better choices for you and your family. Stick to these rules:

1) When you pick up an item, first check to see the total calories per serving, and how large that serving actually is. The serving size on certain foods can be incredibly deceptive. Think for a second about the last time you had pasta for dinner. The correct portion size for pasta is ½ cup! That is incredibly small! The American Diabetes Association would recommend dividing up a pasta meal so that your plate was merely ¼ pasta, ¼ lean meat (poultry, fish, or read meat), and ½ watery, non-starchy vegetables (http://my.clevelandclinic.org/heart/prevention/askdietician/portionsize.aspx). Beginning to pay attention to portion size can be eye-opening, to say the least.

2) Look at how much protein is contained in the item, and then compare the percentage of protein to carbohydrates and fats. Remember, carbohydrates turn into sugar in the body, and the more sugar present, the higher one’s insulin levels will be. We want to control blood sugar and insulin so we can be in a state of fat loss, and one way to do that is to include protein at every meal. If the item in question has no protein and is pure carbs, you will have to combine it with a protein source at your meal to make the meal metabolically optimal.

3) Look at the ingredient list. Again, this comes back to the idea of “eating clean”. If the ingredient list is populated with thirty names that you can’t begin to pronounce, chances are good that it’s much more of a “food product” than a true food. If the ingredient list, by contrast, is fairly simple and common-sense, you can at least be confident that you know the source of the nutrients contained.

When my wife and I have to prepare for a physique competition, the eating can become very bland and monotonous. When I was a bachelor and cooked all of my own clean “bodybuilding” foods, I ate incredibly boring– I ate for function– and nothing ever tasted good. Now, my beautiful wife helps me to actually enjoy eating my clean foods! Per numerous client requests, the below is a sample of how she dresses up normally-bland foods that are perfectly healthy, and makes them sizzle.

Chicken:

12 thawed chicken breasts

2 packets of Grill Mates Seasoning by McCormick

1/2c apple, red or white vinegar

Place the seasoning mix and vinegar in a large bowl. Cut fat off chicken and place in marinade. Place bowl, covered in plastic wrap, in the refrigerator at least 2 hours, preferably overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Grease baking dish with Pam. Place chicken breasts in a 13×9 baking dish, try not to overlap. Pour remaining marinade into baking dish.

Bake for about 15 minutes, flip over chicken breasts and cook for another 8-10 minutes depending on desired doneness.

Egg White Muffins:

This is a very basic recipe that can be tweaked to your individual preferences.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 3-6 sections of a 12-muffin tin with Pam.

Pour/crack 1 meal’s worth of egg whites into a medium size bowl. Wisk for 2-3 minutes.

For sweet muffins: add 2-3 packets of artificial sweetener, 1/2tsp vanilla extract, 1/2tsp cinnamon and wisk. Fill each muffin 2/3 full. The amount of muffins will depend on how many egg whites you use. Place in the oven for 15-20 minutes. Muffins will be done when the center no longer jiggles. If this is a fat meal, add a serving of nuts before cooking. If this is a carb meal, add a serving of oats or fruit before cooking.

For savory muffins: add 1/2tsp salt, 1/4tsp pepper. Fill each muffin ½ full with the wisked egg whites. Finely chop 1 cup desired vegetables and add evenly to each muffin. Place in the oven for 18-25 minutes. Muffins will be done when the center no longer jiggles. If this is a fat meal, add egg yolks before cooking. If this is a carb meal, add a serving of rice, potato, or quinoa. You can also add meat to this meal by using half the egg whites and adding a half serving of chicken or ground turkey.

Tilapia:

12 thawed tilapia filets

¼ c lemon juice

¼ c apple cider vinegar

½ c fresh cilantro or basil

Salt and pepper to taste

Combine ingredients in a gallon bag and marinade for 2-3 hours

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Place on a greased baking dish. Bake for about 10 minutes, flip filets and bake for another 8-10 minutes depending on desired doneness.

Sugar-Free Cinnamon Roasted Nuts

3-4 cups desired nuts (almonds, walnuts, pecans, etc.)

1 egg white

1/3 c Splenda

1-2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven 350 degrees. Grease baking dish.

Wisk egg white, Splenda and cinnamon in a medium bowl. Add nuts to coat. Place nuts layered evenly on the baking dish. Bake for 30-40 minutes depending on desired crunchiness. Every 10 minutes shake the pan to break-up large clusters and to make sure the nuts are cooked evenly on all sides.

You can also make a savory version of this recipe by replacing the Splenda and cinnamon with 2-4 tsp chili-lime or Cajun seasonings.

*Anne’s House of Nuts has great seasonings that you can split among friends if purchased in bulk quantities. The chili-lime and Cajun seasonings are great on sautéed or baked veggies as well as any meat. Depending on your diet, they also have BBQ and Chai seasonings which have carbs in them.

In the gym industry, January 1^st signifies the beginning of “peak season”, the three-to-four month phase when it seems like everybody is motivated to get started and finally get in shape.

Much of this has to do with the concept of “starting over”. Human beings love the idea of a “fresh start”. For those of you who have tried dieting in the past, how many of you started your diets on a Wednesday? None. As everybody knows, pretty much all diets are started on Mondays! (Or, if you really want to be technical, all diets are started “tomorrow”, with tomorrow being a never-arriving day!) If you are currently on a somewhat structured or strict eating plan, and you happen to mess up in the middle of the day, what happens? Chances are, if you are human, you will continue to mess up throughout the rest of the day!

Most people have a very “all-or-nothing” approach to life– good or bad, right or wrong, black or white. The problem is, this way of thinking can be used to justify bad habits and perpetuate problems that need to be dealt with in the immediate.

Holliday Eating

Statistically speaking, very few people in our country will actually lose weight over the Holliday season (between Thanksgiving and January 1^st). Most individuals will struggle with weight and eating issues over the next 6 weeks. University of Texas SW Medical Center estimates that most only gain 1-2lbs over the holidays, but many put the estimate closer to 5lbs. This isn’t an insurmountable amount of weight, per se, but if it is an annual phenomenon, it definitely adds up and lends itself toward long-term obesity and weight-management issues. Ten years down the road, you can expect to be between ten and fifty pounds heavier. This can be particularly frustrating if you are already trying to make behavioral changes and get more fit and healthy. For any of you regularly attending the club, working with a trainer, or just trying to get in better shape, the holidays can indeed be a disheartening struggle.

So what can we do to minimize the impact of the holiday season? Below are some general tips that will help get you through the next six weeks, giving you a head start against the tribe of New Year’s Resolutionists:

Clean Eating

First and foremost, a daily focus on eating “clean” is going to be the greatest weapon in your arsenal. What exactly is “clean eating”? Tosca Reno, author of The Eat-Clean Diet, defines “clean eating” as follows: Clean eating is “eating the way nature intended…. You eat the foods our bodies evolved to function best on, and that makes you feel– and look– fantastic. When you Eat Clean you eat more often. You will eat lean protein, complex carbs, and health fats. These practices keep your blood-sugar levels stable and keep you satisfied” (http://www.eatcleandiet.com/about_the_diet/what_is_eating_clean.aspx).

In a nutshell, “eating clean” can best be described as eating real foods versus eating food products. Eating something that comes out of a wrapper, or out of a box, or out of a can, is most likely a food product. Eating real foods– fruits, vegetables, lean proteins like poultry and fish, and certain complex carbs like oatmeal, sweet potatoes, and brown rice, is sticking to the foods provided naturally to our bodies. This helps immensely to regulate blood sugar and the body’s hormones in general, which allows the body to stay lean and metabolically efficient.

The issue of “clean eating” is really the overarching issue of how to eat in general to lose weight. If you want the most dummy-proof method of “eating healthy” or “eating clean”, here’s a simple rule to live by: if it doesn’t grow on its own, don’t eat it! So what grows on its own? Veggies, fruits, animals (protein sources) and dairy, nuts, and a delimited amount of starches. Pies certainly don’t grow on their own, and neither does ice cream!

Your meals should be focused around getting in a balance of lean proteins from sources like chicken, egg whites, and fish, along with low-glycemic carbohydrate sources like fruits, veggies, and whole-grains, and a certain amount of healthy fat. If you move in this direction with your eating, regardless of time of year, you will be successful in keeping the fat off and being fit and healthy.

Enjoying Life While Following Rules

In my experience, having worked with hundreds of clients over the years, the hardest thing about the holidays is the whole “lingering food”, or “leftovers” phenomenon. Many were raised with the mindset that it is an absolute sin to waste food, or throw it out! Unfortunately, that rule no longer really applies in a modern-day context. We have an over-abundance of food in this country, and that overabundance is the primary cause of the current obesity epidemic. Yet most continue to refuse to throw out food, using their bodies instead as the human garbage disposal.

Much of this is about making rational decisions, rather than emotional decisions. If you emotionally feel guilty about wasting food by throwing it out, chances are good you will hold onto it. And if you hold onto the food, chances are good you will end up eating the majority of it, even though your body doesn’t need it. So on the whole, you will end up gaining weight and increasing the likelihood of health problems down the road, rather than the momentary discomfort of simply throwing away some leftovers.

This can be seen during Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Valentine’s Day, you name it. It is definitely harder if you have children in the house (good luck throwing out your kid’s excess candy!). The key is to be as smart as the situation will allow you to be.

If you are going to somebody else’s house for Thanksgiving, things will be a little easier because, chances are, most of the leftovers will stay at the host’s house and not come home to yours. If you happen to be hosting, one thing you can do is divvy up leftovers with the other guests, sending them all home with a post-holiday plate. One deliciously hedonistic and gluttonous meal is not going to do that much damage to anybody; and in fact, even two meals will not do so! But picking at the plates for the next 10 days will definitely add up!

The moral of the story: allow yourself to enjoy Thanksgiving, and maybe even some leftovers. But don’t feel compelled to eat an entire twenty-pound turkey and several bowls of stuffing and potatoes in the following days. If it will help your overall goals, throw out the leftovers and get back to your regular eating plan as soon as possible following the holiday.

Social Outings

Beyond the obvious Thanksgiving dinner (and days following), there is the issue of parties. Around the holidays, it seems there is a never-ending series of parties and social outings to attend, all of which have their own dietary dilemmas. The holiday season is a time for cheer and happiness, after all, and it makes sense to celebrate with family, friends, coworkers, and loved ones. However, if the overall effect is counterproductive to your larger life-goals, you might find yourself with a little buyer’s remorse come January One.

So how do we eat intelligently around Holiday Parties? A lot of it comes down to planning. If you know you will be going to an office party on Saturday night, your best bet is to eat clean throughout the day. Do NOT try to scale back on your normal clean-eating intake; this will only make you ravenously hungry come nighttime, and you will in fact double up on the junk, leading to results that are twice as bad.

About an hour or so before you leave the house for the party, sit down and have a healthy meal. This is very similar to the concept of eating before you go grocery shopping. If you are going to a friend’s house, a bar or a restaurant where there is going to be tons of delicious food and drink, you will be far less likely to binge and over-indulge if your belly is already somewhat filled up with good options.

Once at the party, try to follow some common-sense rules to minimize damage. Stick to water or diet soda. Eggnog is, hands down, one of THE most caloric food-stuffs on the planet, with one cup yielding 343 calories, 19g fat, and 35g carbs. To give you an idea of contrast, a Big Mac from McDonalds has about 580 calories. So if you have a whopping 14oz of eggnog– less than two cups– you have actually consumed more calories than a Big Mac! And this is BEFORE adding all the delicious alcohol, mind you!

When at parties, once the food is revealed, try to start with a veggie plate to fill up a little bit. Move on to protein sources. Save sweets for the very end, and even then, be judicious in what you select. You don’t need to sample every single item on the tray. Pick what seems most appealing, enjoy it, and then be done, simple as that.

Keep Working Out!

Tracing this all back to the all-or-nothing mindset of most individuals, many start blowing off the gym during holiday season, on the premise of, “Well, I’m eating like crap anyways, might as well not work out. After all, what’s the point? I’m not going to lose any weight.”

Well, this might be true. But wouldn’t it be better to at least stay neutral, than to positively backslide? If you’ve already resigned yourself to not eating very well over the next few months, you could at LEAST continue working out vigorously several times a week to try to limit weight gain, or negate it completely. Yes, you could put everything on the backburner until January 1^st, but then it’s going to be that much more difficult from a behavioral standpoint to get back into the groove of working out regularly. Your muscles will hurt all over again just like they did in the beginning, your endurance will be down, your energy will be lower, and the task in front of you will be that much greater. No matter how bad your eating habits happen to be over the holiday season, continue to train hard and reap the benefits of being dedicated to fitness and health.

Conclusion

I, personally, have always been a big fan of starting a diet on an odd date– middle of the week, for instance, or December 28^th. I like the idea of “getting a leg up” and not getting lost in the pack. I think it shows a certain dedication and mindset that is lacking with those who start on January 1^st. Yes, you can still enjoy life during the holiday season, and maybe even “loosen up” a little bit, but that is no reason to completely give up on your fitness and physique goals. Continue to train hard, eat clean, shop smart, and plan ahead, and you might even be further along come the end of the year, then you were heading into the holiday season!

What made him feel special, exactly? Was it the fact that Mr. P cared about Henry? It wouldn’t seem so; the article is laced with tales of Mr. P’s borderline cruelty, punching Henry in the chest to test his strength and muscularity. By all traditional descriptions, Mr. P would be described as mean, as an impediment to Henry’s self-esteem.

Henry Rollins “felt special” after being told to purchase the weights because he had been given the command to rise.

The command to rise is the most precious gift you can give another human being. Setting the bar high, having expectations for others above their current abilities, forces them to jump higher, to stretch farther, to try harder. And when this call is answered, it leads consistently and without fail to self betterment.

Giving someone permission to perpetually “accept who they currently are”, to worship at the altar of mediocrity, is not kind or caring, but cruel. It encourages the individual, be they your friend or wife or husband or child, to stumble and plod through life like an injured and lost puppy dog, rather than majestically springing forward at the breakneck speed of a cheetah.

Mr. Pepperman laid before Henry Rollins a very specific challenge: to build his body into a better specimen. It was objective, concrete, measurable. He had a specific way of tracking progress– taking a punch. And until Henry met that standard, he was a failure, plain and simple.

This is one of the greatest values of strength training: the perpetual call to rise. You are presented with a very simple task, to move a weight from point A to point B. And as soon as you can accomplish that goal, it becomes modified– you now have to increase the weight, up the ante, raise the bar, both metaphorically and literally. A macroscopic goal breaks down into microscopic goals, but remains open-ended. Strength training is the perpetual call to rise, demanding one push harder and harder to achieve endless levels of excellence.

I always instruct my clients that they should train with the intention of always adding more weight to the bar. Realistically, strength will not always increase in a linear fashion– you won’t be bench pressing 1,000lbs any time soon. But you should always train with the intention of getting up to that 1,000lbs bench press. If you don’t at least have that mindset when it comes to your training, you will continue bench-pressing the same weight for the rest of your days in the gym, and remain exactly the same.

Getting stronger is hard. Getting better at anything is hard. That’s why it’s called “getting better”– you are going through a process of tearing down the current situation (current muscles, knowledge level, economic status, level of spiritual enlightenment) and rebuilding it at a higher level. If it was easy, everybody would have perfect bodies, perfect minds, perfect income levels, and perfect souls. And we don’t.

Some people, when confronted with the call to rise, get scared. Some, by contrast, get angry and go into defensive mode– “Whatever dude, I don‘t care, his opinion doesn‘t mean anything”. Still others step back and think about the importance of that call, of whether it’s a worthwhile challenge or not. And some fearlessly rise to meet the call.

One of the greatest influences in my life was Mr. Sulek, my middle school band teacher. He was a hot-head for whom nothing was ever good enough. He was once almost removed by the school board after losing his temper during a band practice– with middle school kids, mind you– and throwing a folding chair through a plate glass window. Mr. Sulek was intensely passionate about excellence, and about striving to be one’s best. He was the Bobby Knight of the middle-school band world: so emotionally invested in dragging everybody up to the highest level that he couldn’t control himself, couldn’t channel that passion and turn it off when needed. He did not hand out compliments easily, and probably made the majority of the band kids feel bad, like failures.

When I got to Wheaton Warrenville Middle School in 1990, I walked into auditions for 6th grade jazz band late and ill-prepared. Mr. Sulek tore me apart. He allowed me an audition, but hastily stuck me in the lowest jazz band of the three. I went home that night and cried, ready to quit the band. I didn’t know why I was being treated so poorly. But I decided that I didn’t care, that I loved to play, and that I had to show him how good I was. Three years later, as my 8th grade graduation was coming up, Mr. Sulek pulled me aside and informed me that he was presenting me with the Musician of the Year award. This award had never been given to a percussionist, and I was the first, because of how hard I had worked, how far I had come, and how much I had excelled. As he handed me my trophy, for the second time Mr. Sulek drove me to tears. But this time, they were tears of accomplishment and joy. I knew I had taken the beatings, been handed the command, and accepted it. I had risen.

Mr. Sulek never punched me in the solar plexus ala Mr. Pepperman, but in his own way, he did– every time he corrected me, every time he let me know I was doing something wrong, every time he told me I had a long way to go, every time he refused to hand me a false or meaningless compliment. Refusing to hand me that empty compliment was the kindest thing anybody ever did for me. Ever since, I have refused to be mediocre. I choose, instead, to rise.

In my years in the personal training industry, I have seen an endless stream of trainers that are concerned first and foremost with being the “friend” of the client: of being empathetic and understanding, of caring and nurturing, of not pushing too hard or too fast. I have also watched all of the clients of those trainers remain exactly the same, week after week, month after month, year after year, while pouring untold quantities of dollars into the project. Amidst all the friendly and passive trainers, I have seen a scant one or two that truly pushed their people, that never accepted second best, that didn’t take excuses, that truly refused to buckle when presented with their clients’ struggles. It’s hard, when you care about somebody, to look them in the eye and say, “Too bad, you need to suck it up”. In the heat of the moment, it’s not always fun being the bad guy. But down the road, when you see that it has all paid off, you know it’s worth it.

While assembling my website recently I had to re-read all of my client testimonials, and I noticed many had a recurring theme: “I felt like I had to stick to my diet and get my workout in, because if I didn’t, I would be letting you down”. I hope I can be the Mr. Pepperman or Mr. Sulek in the lives of some of my clients. I hope I am never perceived as “nice” or “friendly” or “caring” or “empathetic”. I hope I am considered mean and cruel and harsh, like a man delivering blow after blow to the solar plexus. Because then, I will know I have given the command to rise. And some, inevitably, will meet that call.

-David A. Johnston